The EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers appeared before a rare joint hearing of House and Senate committees on February 4, 2015 to justify the rule the agencies proposed last year to define “waters of the United States.” Notwithstanding a previous justification of the rule as merely providing “clarity” over streams that EPA and the Corps already regulate, EPA Administrator McCarthy conceded that…
As 2015 gets under way, things are pretty quiet on the Mine Safety and Health Administration (“MSHA”) front. MSHA published its semi-annual regulatory agenda back in November, and it is less ambitious than in years past. In the coming year, we anticipate MSHA will address only a few regulatory issues. Notably, the agency recently extended the deadline for filing written…
PADEP has announced the release of the fourth in a series of ongoing reports detailing the effects of surface subsidence caused by underground mining in Pennsylvania. The report, prepared by the University of Pittsburgh, addresses the effects of mining in Armstrong, Beaver, Cambria, Clearfield, Elk, Greene, Indiana, Jefferson, Somerset and Washington counties. The report,…
The Sierra Club and other anti-coal groups filed THREE lawsuits against USEPA on January 7, 2015 in federal courts in Kentucky and West Virginia.
Two of the actions, one in each state, allege that EPA has not acted on petitions submitted by the Plaintiffs several years ago to withdraw EPA approval of the State NPDES programs. See Kentuckians for the Commonwealth v. McCarthy, No.…
